The famous Mona Lisa (1503), by Leonardo da Vinci, was once again the target of protest action this morning. According to the France-Presse news agency, the protest was led by two protesters, who threw red and orange soup towards the work exhibited at the Louvre Museum, in Paris, amidst the “screams of the crowd [que se encontrava] at the Museum”. The action was taken up by the Riposte Alimentaire collective, which demands the right to “healthy and sustainable food”.
ALERT – Climate activists throw soup on the Mona Lisa painting at the Louvre museum. @CLPRESSFR pic.twitter.com/Aa7gavRRc4
— CLPRESS / Press agency (@CLPRESSFR) January 28, 2024
The painting is protected by bullet-proof glass and was not damaged, the Louvre assured.
This action follows farmers’ protests in France, which have gained traction in recent days in several regions of the country: protesters are blocking roads to demand that Emmanuel Macron’s government take measures against price pressure, rising taxes, low wages and what are said to be “suffocating” regulations in terms of environmental protection.
“What is more important? Art or the right to a healthy and sustainable diet”, asked the protesters, standing in front of Leonardo’s painting, while some Louvre employees tried to cover them. “Your agricultural system is sick. Our farmers are dying on the job. One Frenchman in three does not cook all his meals every day”, said the activists. According to the French newspaper Releasethe soup was hidden in a thermos coffee flask, making it possible to enter the museum with food.
In a press release sent to France-Presse, the Riposte Alimentaire collective describes itself as “a French civil resistance campaign that aims to drive radical social and climate change”. Mona Lisa is presented as “the starting point” of a movement that demands “a clear demand for everyone: social security for sustainable food”.
“A Mona Lisa, like our heritage, belongs to future generations. No cause can justify it being the target of attacks”, wrote the French Minister of Culture, Rachida Dati, on the social network X (formerly Twitter). “I’m not sure that the Mona Lisa is the biggest polluter in France. What is the objective?”, asked the Government spokesperson, Prisca Thévenot, on the France 3 television channel.
According to the Releasethe Louvre Museum, the most visited in the world, quickly activated a crisis unit: the room where the work was located was evacuated and is being cleaned.
This is the latest chapter in a wave of protests carried out by activists against world-famous works of art. In May 2022, the Mona Lisa had already been the target of an attack with a cream pie, in an ecological warning about the state of the planet. There too, it survived intact.
In Portugal, there is only one recent case in the Belém Cultural Center museum, where, in October last year, two activists from the Climáximo collective covered the work with red paint Woman in an armchair (metamorphosis), by Pablo Picasso. “There is no art on a dead planet”, said one of the activists. “Governments and companies have declared war on society. They are killing us”, added another activist. Protected by acrylic, the work was not damaged.
News updated with the reactions of the French Government